Once children come along, we remember the old faces and places, and happily resurrect them. Why should they not share our childhood thrills?
My daughter lost a tooth the other day. She didn't really lose it though. It came out with a bit of wiggling on her part, and was then zealously hoarded in expectation of a visit from the tooth fairy: not the suspicious chap in the white tutu, who wouldn't make it into our house without the dogs going wild, but the real thing. Wikipedia doesn't tell me what the real thing looks like, but I know it is not a half shaven chap in ballet shoes.
According to some cultures, it could be a tooth mouse, but I know this is not true: if it were we would find what was left of it the next morning, after the cat had played with it.
Not wanting to take a chance on any of the mythical options, we retrieved the tooth from under the pillow and shoved in some money. Unfortunately my daughter was extremely upset the next morning. According to her the tooth fairy brought a number of girls at her school one hundred bucks per tooth. Perhaps I should have waited to see if the tooth fairy delivered in person. If not, it would have been quite possible to blame it on a meeting, or perhaps problems getting the tooth wagon started.
But I'm glad I didn't. My daughter is as sharp as one of those old fashioned razors, and I was surprised at how gleeful she was in, in spite of the pain, when the tooth became loose. If the hundred bucks had materialised from supernatural sources, I am sure that by now, I would have had to move the pliers somewhere safe, probably behind lock and key. Dentistry should be reserved for dentists.
I am not sure what happens to the teeth that are collected. I read somewhere that in Norse mythology, teeth, hair and nail clippings are used to build a boat for one of the gods. They have probably switched to carbon composites by now, which is much more hygienic, so that is in doubt.
Of all the conceits of childhood. I like the tooth fairy the most. It's an innocuous way of recompensing young ones for the discomfort. The stork that brings the babies doesn't work for me, and the monster under the bed or in the cupboard is a recipe for children sleeping with mummy and daddy well into their teens. Father Christmas is cool, but expensive. And the Easter Bunny has left me with a slight sense of revulsion whenever rabbit appears on a menu.
The interesting thing is that these phenomena leave residual traces of belief. Eating rabbit seems mildly akin to apostasy, with the exception of the chocolate variety and, on reflection, even that seems a bit off before the chocolate hunger sets in.
Neurologically speaking, memories are formed in the brain by chemicals. Once a certain type of behaviour or memory is formed, especially during childhood, that path persists. So, in a way, we are setting up the kids to have residual beliefs that are almost impossible to shake. The fact that it remains, even if rigidly suppressed, means that we create ideal conditions for repetition.
The beliefs are not too difficult to suppress, on a rational basis. A combination of logic, admissions by parents who get caught in the act and peer pressure on the playground ensure that everything is deeply buried and the grave decorated with the flowers of scorn. On an emotional basis, happiness is built into the neural pathways and so the burial is accompanied with a sense of regret.
Once children come along, we remember the old faces and places, and happily resurrect them. Why should they not share our childhood thrills? I think, on some level, the beliefs that we instil into the minds of the wide-eyed tots is a way of making amends for the apostasy of childhood beliefs, even if it means shoving coins under the pillows, ourselves.
All this is nothing more than an observation, and there is no great truth other than the fact that the Tooth Fairy brings a sense of happiness, provided the economics is right. The Tooth Fairy is real in a neurological sense: it is a virus which spreads from parent to child. And there is the thought that eating rabbit over Easter somehow feels wrong.
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